CogDogBlog awakes from a case of the techno-flu. It got into the server and the database requests were coughing for 2 weeks — no just the tired blog operator. The only way out of not blogging is picking the thing up (old story).
In that flu fog many key dates were missed – the date when I took a plane flight to Regina to meet Cori for our first “date” and also last weekend, the lap around the sun for old Felix (“hey, who is calling me old?”) who crossed his 12th solar orbit path last weekend. I patched together that 1, 2 = 12 collage on my phone from his puppy photo when maybe he was 5 months old at the Humane Society (they gave me a copy when I adopted him 2 years later) with a more recent photo.
That’s what you get for being 12 a list of photos. Here are ones I nabbed from eacy year he has been in my life on or close to his birthday.
Send cards and bones to Felix on Mastodon (all the cool dogs are federated!) @felixadog
Before Alan (2014)
That first summer I had Felix (2016), we went to a dog event in Flagstaff, and a rep from the Payson Humane Society recognized Felix. She emailed me his puppy day photo from his first adoption round there. She shared the story of his first name being “Strale” as an Italian word for lightning bolts like the marks he had on his puppy pose.
2016 (2 years old) First Birthday Together (Strawberry, AZ)
This was less than 2 months after his “Gotchya Day”, but he was settled into this cabin as his home.
2017 (3 years old) A Hike on the Mogollon Rim
After a year plus together, we had our routines down! Lots of walks. Getting a dog and doing many more walks (and a few other habit changes) yielded a blog worthy weight loss.
2018 (4 years old) At Home in Saskatchewan
All kinds of changes, same old peaceful sleeper. Cori and I were married, so dog and I packed up the truck and moved to a new home in Saskatchewan, both happier dogs for the change.
2019 (5 years old) Mortlach, SK
Indeed, a mighty fine present is a new rawhide.
2020 (6 years old) Saskatchewan, Pandemic Times
All that sleep and rest makes for time to ponder the world, the meaning of life, whether we would see our llamas on the next walk….
2021 (7 years old) At Ursa Acres
DON’T TEASE ME WITH CHEESE! flickr photo by cogdogblog shared into the public domain using Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication (CC0)
We had moved to our 16 acre rural homestead, and cheese is the upgraded gift from rawhide, maybe. Look at those eyes! Also this year, in one of those web serendipity things, an older Felix photo was requested for use to sell an interesting kind of Belgian dog food. Those stories only happen on the open web.
2022 (8 years old) At Ursa Acres
Indeed, another photo, you are 8 years old now, still looking good.
2023 (9 years old) At Ursa Acres
Still philosophizing from the floor position. At ease and calm, storing energy for our next walk. Or are we going camping soon? We did blog celebrate this year;s Gotchya Day
2024 (10 years old) At Ursa Acres
Looking good at double digits. This was a year the photos fell way behind schedule, closest I had to the May birthday date. But handsome! Adorable! Worthy of being a viral dog on Instagram!
2025 (11 years old) At Ursa Acres
For the 11th, and attempt to remake the puppy pose in the grass. The Strale marks are there, more faint. Same cute dog. Got a blog post out of the deal.
2026 (12 years old) At Ursa Acres
Here in year 12, Felix takes on the job of mentoring our new energetic puppy, Pimm. He does his best to stay up with her play moves, and we have seen evidence Felix has taught her to snow roll.
2027 (13 years old)
Stay tuned, the story and the photos go on! What more can I blog about these days than dogs?
Featured Image: Collage of my own CC0 images of Felix with a screenshot of just a few of the ones tagged Felix in Flickr (guess how many?) – since 2024 those get posted to Felix’s Mastodon @felixadog , he’s a tech savvy ActivityPub enabled dog.
